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Like This? Try That

Every once in a while we meet people who have a huge impact on our lives – people who open us up to new ideas, attitudes and perspectives by sharing their wisdom.For Mitch Albom, that person was his college professor Morrie Schwartz. Twenty years later, Albom contacts Schwartz in the final months of the professor’s life, rekindles their relationship and turns their visits into final “lessons” on how to live.

Every spring, Yankees pitcher Ron Guidry would pick up Hall of Fame catcher Yogi Berra at the airport and together they’d watch spring training while trading stories and teasing each other. Berra had once been a mentor for Guidry and Guidry knew the young, new players would benefit from “Mr. Yogi’s” knowledge. Teeming with humor and baseball yarns, this book is about wisdom being passed from one generation to the next.

Often, college professors are asked to give a “last lecture,” a talk that, imagining their future demise, ruminates on what matters most to them. Randy Pausch, computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon was asked to give such a lecture. Diagnosed with terminal cancer, Pausch didn’t have to imagine this lecture as his last. Pausch combines humor, inspiration and intelligence on the importance of overcoming obstacles, enabling the dreams of others, and seizing every moment.

Before his death in 2008, Tim Russert had become one of the most admired figures in television journalism. Through his career, he spent time with presidents, world leaders, celebrities and sports heroes. But one person represented strength of character, grace and simple decency: his father, Big Russ. Russert celebrates the connection between fathers and sons and the life lessons passed down through generations.

Nonagenarian Edward and recently divorced reporter Isabel meet weekly for dinner. Their discussions range from the importance of beauty, to living after loss, to the power of love, to how to make a succulent duck breast. Edward shares more than his recipes or how to create the perfect martini – he teaches Isabel the luxury of slowing down and deconstructing her life by cutting it back to the bone and examining the guts, no matter how messy it proves to be.

Completed just two days before his death in 2014 at age 97, Louis Zamperini shares his lifetime of wisdom, insight, and humor. In his own words, Zamperini reveals the essential values and lessons that sustained him throughout his remarkable journeys that were described in Laura Hillenbrand’s award winning biography, Unbroken.